Wind power is considered one of the cleanest, most environmentally friendly energy sources presently available, and wind turbines have gained increased attention in this regard. A modern wind turbine typically includes a tower, generator, gearbox, nacelle, and one or more rotor blades. The rotor blades capture kinetic energy from wind using known airfoil principles and transmit the kinetic energy through rotational energy to turn a shaft coupling the rotor blades to a gearbox, or if a gearbox is not used, directly to the generator. The generator then converts the mechanical energy to electrical energy that may be deployed to a utility grid.
During operation of a wind turbine, components of the wind turbine are subjected to various loads due to the aerodynamic wind loads acting on the blades. Blade loading is dependent on the wind speed, the tip speed ratio and/or the pitch setting of the blades. Tip speed ratio is the ratio of the rotational velocity of the blade tip to wind speed. It can be desirable to adjust operation of the wind turbine based on signals indicative of tip speed ratio (e.g. various speed readings) to adjust loading of the rotor blades of the wind turbine and/or to increase energy production of the wind turbine.
To reduce rotor blade loading, various methods and apparatus have been developed to allow the rotor blades to shed a portion of the loads experienced thereby. Such methods and apparatus include, for example, pitching the rotor blades and/or reducing generator torque during operation. Accordingly, many wind turbines include a wind turbine controller that can operate the wind turbine in various ways based on the wind turbine loading. For instance, under various operating conditions, the wind turbine can adjust the torque of a generator and/or the pitch angle of the rotor blades to adjust the tip speed ratio to meet a desired tip speed ratio setpoint to increase energy capture by the wind turbine.
In certain instances, it can be desirable to adjust the performance of the wind turbine controller to increase or enhance energy production. However, in some cases, it may be difficult to adjust the operation of turbine controller itself. For instance, the computer-readable instructions (e.g. source code) implemented by the turbine controller in executing various control routines may not be accessible or otherwise capable of being modified.
Accordingly, systems and methods for adjusting the operation of a turbine control system without requiring access or modification of computer-readable instructions implemented by the turbine controller would be welcomed in the technology.